A recent study published in Science, by a team of Hungarian journalists finds that your dog understands both emotion and the lexicon of our word
What does this mean for you?
The next time someone gives you trouble for those conversations with your dog you can tell them that science is on your side. It looks like those of us that spend hours talking with our pets aren’t so crazy after all. The bad news, next time you try and trick Fido by telling him it’s time to go to the vet in a happy voice, he’s not going to be falling for it.
To conduct the study, the team lead by Attila Andics trained 13 different dogs, mostly golden retrievers, and border collies to sit completely still for a 7 minute MRI.
Atilla then played a recording of phrases such as good boy, clever, and that’s it. They were all played in a praising tone, a neutral word in a neutral tone, a praising word in a neutral tone, and a neutral word in a praising tone.
Amazingly, the dog’s reward center only responded positively to both a praising word in a praising tone. This proves that our pets not only understand our expressions and vocal tone but also what we tell them.
So next time you spend some one-on-one time with your pet, watch what you say. Your dog understands you.
Most of my day is spent playing with dogs. When they nap, I’m here working on my blog. You’re welcome to reach out and connect with me.
